For the author, Firdaus Kanga, Cambridge contained the essence of England. The place became something entirely different, but more meaningful by the time he left, for he had then become acquainted with Stephen Hawking.
During a walking tour through Cambridge, the guide mentions the name of Stephen Hawking and tells the author about the brilliance of this differently abled man, who held the chair of Isaac Newton at the university. The author become immediately startled for he know, but author becomes immediately startled for he knew, but had forgotten about Stephen, the writer of ‘A Brief History of Time’.
The Author Calls up at the Residence of Stephen Hawking
After the walking tour, Kanga immediately rushed to the telephone booth and phoned at Hawking’s residence. Hawking’s assistant received the phone. Kanga informs Hawking’s assistant that he had come from India on a wheel chair was working on the topic of his travel in Britain. He seeks an appointment from Hawking’s assistant to be able to meet Hawking in person, no matter if briefly. The assistant fixes up a half an hour meeting between the author and Hawking.
Meeting with Stephen Hawking
The next afternoon, when he meets Hawking, Hawking informs him that he had not been very braved and that he had no choice. Kanga wished to shares his opinion that living a disembodied, fragmented life can never be a choice, but he kept his opinions to himself. He was closely observing Hawking, how Hawking had to constantly look for and press the buttons to find to right words to express himself.
He was talking through computer automated sound that he was operating through the only moving part of his body, his long pale fingers. After he puts the receiver down, Kanga begins to feel weak. He generalises the state of disabled people and discusses that it is difficult to live up to the pretence of being brave at all times. The only time one genuinely feels brave and strong is when someone equally disabled does something great, achieves something.
Exhaustion and Frustration
Very often the author would notice Hawking closing his eyes in sheer and frustration. His mind was quite active, but his thoughts lay frozen from time-to-time in the absence of a quick convertor of his thoughts, his own speech. The author had heard people branding disabled people as continuously unhappy, so he asked Hawking a question, whether he was happy from inside. Hawking replied that he found it annoying when people patronised him or tried to pity him. The author further asked him if he got irritated with people like him who came to meet him and force him to talk and respond. Hawking immediately replied with a yes, but then smiled.
The Author Observes Hawking’s Appearance
Kanga found the first glimpses of Hawking as shocking. He found his appearance as still as the pictures in newspapers and magazines. He felt that his body was entirely wasted and reduced to nothingness. It was entirely titled to one side. His eyes, however, caught the author’s attention. The eyes were still full of life, they wanted to speak and speak urgently, but it was hard to decode that message.
On seeing the condition of Hawking and some kind of inner glow that his personality seemed to emanate, the author becomes sure that even the body is irrelevant and everything else surely an accessory. The author, though not a believer of souls, began to believe in the concreteness of Hawking as an eternal soul.
Kanga Keeds on with the Meeting
This time Kanga asks him about becoming aware of the intensity of kindness in the world, through one’s disabled status. Hawking agrees with him, but Kanga was not sure if that agreement was a serious one. The synthesiser through which Hawking’s voice could be heard was a mono-tone one.
Author was constantly glancing his wrist watch to make the best use of this half an hour long meeting and as he was doing it, he realises that he enjoys a much better condition. He could at least move his various limbs, his only disability being that he could never stand or walk.
Hawking-a Source of Inspiration
Kanga informs Hawking that he is a source of inspiration for him and many others and then asks him if this piece of information helps him in any way. Hawking, quite obviously, replies with a no. the author then seeks from Hawking some final advice for disabled people. Hawking advices him that all disabled people should concentrate on what they are good at. They should not unnecessarily waste time on Olympics for disabled and so on.
Hawking Shows Kanga his Garden
Hawking asks Kanga to have tea with him and takes him to show the garden. They could not talk much as the glare of the Sun made the letters on the screen disappear, so Hawking became silent. It was more than an hour and it was time to leave. The author wanted to kiss him and cry, but he could not do so. He merely touched him on the shoulders and left. Kanga looks at Hawking as bravest of the selves and knew that he was moving towards him to become what he was an embodiment of. And this very neatly marked for him the end of his journey in Britain.